


Stop Me If You've Heard (Lived) this One Before

by Lady_Ganesh



Category: Atlantis (UK TV)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Groundhog Day, M/M, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-08-14
Packaged: 2018-12-09 04:24:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11661558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Ganesh/pseuds/Lady_Ganesh
Summary: Icarus loses Pythagoras, over and over again. But he thinks he can learn how to make it right.





	Stop Me If You've Heard (Lived) this One Before

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aurilly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aurilly/gifts).



> All character death is part of the Groundhog Day loop-ing. So, in the words of the Princess Bride trailer, it all turns out okay!

The morning dawned too bright and too harsh. The city was quieter than it had ever been in the days when Minos ruled, but it was a quiet born of fear and deprivation, not calm. Icarus pushed the blanket aside and went to the basin to wash up. His hands felt dry. Normally he'd rub olive oil into them, but that was scarce these days, as well. And there was no one for him to touch. No one he wanted to be gentle for.

It seemed like a lifetime ago, the days he'd thought--

He'd been a fool to dream. To want anything. Even his own father thought him a traitor and a coward. And Pythagoras--

Pythagoras and his clever fingers and his soothing voice.

A door forever closed.

A fool, and doubly one for mourning what he could never have had. Pythagoras spent his days with heroes, the likes of Jason and Hercules. Men who would have never taken the Queen's tainted protection, who would have found a better solution.

He'd tried so hard to do the right thing. Heroes would be all right, he'd believed. They'd save the day, no matter what. His responsibility had been to keep his father safe, and then all would be well. Despite everything.

He splashed the tepid water on his face. Self-loathing could wait. He had work to do, this day. There was still hope, while Jason and Ariadne drew breath. And his father still needed care.

While he was at the market, trying to barter one of his father’s small inventions for the medicine Daedaleus desperately needed, he caught the rumor. The Queen was dead, and even as they spoke Goran went to negotiate peace with Ariadne and Jason.

Icarus’s heart lifted, a little. He’d been right. The Kingdom would be restored, with Jason and Ariadne ruling side by side. He might even be able to…

But to hope for Pythagoras was to hope too much. He contented himself with returning to his father with the medicine and welcome news.

And then Pythagoras came to his door, and he truly, finally understood what it was to have a broken heart. _I understand the reasons why you did it...but I will never forgive you._

He cried himself to sleep.

 

* * *

 

The next morning began with the blowing of horns. The sound should have been joyous.

Icarus felt nothing but sorrow. The fire swam before his reddened eyes as he mixed together more medicine for his father.

Daedaelus was already sitting, warming his hands. “Will you go to the coronation?”

“No,” he said. “You are ill. I’ll stay with you.”

“I’m well enough,” his father said, rising. “But you, I fear, are still sick at heart.”

“I’ll survive,” he said. “But I think my place is here, today. Pythagoras--he will not want to see me.”

“Not for a while yet, if at all, I’m afraid.” Daedaelus rose and sat by the fire. “You should go out tonight, son. There will be joy, at having the kingdom restored again. It will not cure your sorrow, but it might yet do you good.”

“Perhaps,” Icarus said, knowing nothing could ease the cold pain in his chest. “Right now, I’ve breakfast to make.”

Before they had finished eating, the cry went up. Jason and Ariadne were attacked before they could receive the blessing of the gods. Pasiphae once again on the throne, blood again in the streets. How could their small city suffer so much pain?

He stayed with his father through the day, sneaking out a few times to try and find out the truth. Goran was dead, Melas dead, Jason and his compatriots fled with the Oracle. Icarus felt certain that Pythagoras was still alive; surely he would know otherwise. Surely he would feel--

Surely he would know.

He stayed with his father through the day, avoiding the rumors and chaos. Daedaelus had finally regained his strength, he was pleased to realize. When night fell, he could leave their apartment and see what little he could do to help, if anything could be done at all.

But things only grew worse as night fell. The rumors contradicted one another: Jason and Ariadne had already fled the city, they had been slaughtered, they had taken shelter somewhere in the lower city.

“What of Pythagoras?” he’d dared ask, only once.

Calpurnius, a man he’d counted as a friend all his life, had just stared at him in scorn. “What does the life of one man matter, in times like these?”

“Of course,” he had managed to stammer, before returning home.

Just before midnight, the news rang out; Pasiphae had triumphed, the rebels killed. “All of them?” Icarus asked, as much a fool as he had ever been.

“Slaughtered in the street like dogs,” Ione said, sadly. “Handsome Hercules, and that skinny boy--the clever one--”

“Pythagoras,” Icarus said, his heart seizing in his throat.

“Yes,” she said. “They--he died a fighter, they say. I wouldn’t have thought he was.”

“I knew,” Icarus said, and could say no more.

 

* * *

 

 

The next morning began with the blowing of horns. Icarus groaned from his bed. “Haven’t we suffered enough?”

“What are you talking of, boy?” his father said. “Today is the coronation. I know your heart is aching, but at least--”

“The coronation of Pasiphae,” he said bitterly. “Why am I to celebrate that?”

Daedaelus stared at him in horror. “Have you gone mad? Pasiphae is dead. Today Jason and Ariadne return to Atlantis to be crowned.”

Had his father gone mad? Yesterday had been a nightmare, to be sure, but--

The horns blew again. Icarus stepped out into the street, too agitated to dress or wash. “Galenos,” he said. “Is the coronation today?”

“Yes,” the night-soil man said. “Surely you heard? Ariadne will reclaim the throne, with Jason at her side. They go to the temple this morning.”

“Oh,” Icarus said.

Perhaps it had been a nightmare?

But the day had felt so _real._

Icarus prepared his father's medicine and began cooking breakfast. A nightmare, certainly, borne of his own guilty conscience. Perhaps he should attend the coronation. It would not earn Pythagoras's forgiveness, but it might feel like he was coming closer to making amends.

But before they finished breakfast, the cry went up, once again. Jason and Ariadne attacked. The temple defiled.

"You knew this," his father said. "How did you--"

"I don't know!" Icarus cried, and confessed the truth to him. "The day comes for me again, as wretched as it was before. I must--I must help them. Perhaps this is a curse, and the way to lift it is to...change my fate. Their fate."

"I wish you luck, then, my son," Daedalus said. "If we've not both gone mad. But you should--"

"No," Icarus said, reaching for his sword. "Hesitation cost me Pythagoras's life once already. I will not let it happen again."

"It's too early for such things, you fool. They'll be hiding for now, and--"

"I'll find them," Icarus said. "I have no choice."

The guards found him first. "I want to speak to Goran," he said, as they clapped him into chains. "I demand--"

"Goran's dead," one of the guards said. Icarus had never learned his name, but the man had never liked him. "And there's no one to protect your traitorous soul any more. You'll be killed in the morning, with the others."

 _Others_ turned out to be a ragged crew, a few who might have been rebels, most thieves and prostitutes who might have cheated a guard at a game of cards or made an enemy of them in some other trivial way. For whatever reason, they decided Icarus was dangerous enough to keep in chains.

Sleep finally claimed him, but long after he had learned of Jason and Ariadne's deaths. Long after he had wept his eyes dry for Pythagoras.

 

* * *

 

Icarus woke in his own bed, to the sound of horns.

 _Perhaps it's not a curse,_ he thought. _Perhaps this is my chance for redemption._

He spent the day in the city, learning every rumor, trying to decide how to intervene and when. When night fell, he felt the guards moving in, but it was worth it. Worth their suspicion, worth their eyes. Even if they imprisoned him--

When he felt the knife at his ribs, the impossible, painful heat of the wound, he realized how much he had miscalculated.

 

* * *

 

Icarus woke in his own bed, to the sound of horns.

 _At least I have more time,_ he thought.

 

* * *

 

The next days were spent in investigation. Freed from the worry of death, it was easier to roam Atlantis in search of the truth. (The worst days, Icarus realized quickly, were in fact the ones where he lived, where he went to bed knowing how deeply he had failed, that Pythagoras would once more not live to see the dawn.) The repetition was frustrating, but Icarus kept hope that he could change things. Save Jason and Ariadne, Hercules and Pythagoras. Perhaps even save his own cursed soul.

Whatever the cost might be, he would pay it. He would repeat the day forever if he would find Pythagoras alive at the end of it. His own fate didn't matter.

After what might have been a week, or two--it grew hard to tell the days apart, with your surroundings returning to the same point every morning--he decided he had learned enough. He could only act at night, under cover of darkness. Going from house to house in the lower city seemed impracticable, even with unlimited time.

He decided to ask the cleverest man he knew.

 

"Well," Daedalus said, "If you haven't lost your mind along with Pythagoras, you're in quite a dilemma."

"I haven't lost my mind," Icarus said sullenly. "It's a curse, or some kind of--perhaps I'm doomed to lose forever. I don't know. But I have to try saving him."

"Of course." Daedalus took his hand. "Don't worry. I have a plan."

 

The wings were rickety and awkward, but Icarus had died before. “If the sun is too hot," Daedalus said, "the wax will melt and you will plummet to the ground and almost certainly die."

 _It's night,_ Icarus thought, but he was too afraid to worry about such things.

"But remember, don’t flap. Glide."

"Glide," Icarus repeated. The lower city was so far below, and he still had no idea where Icarus or Jason were. But he had to try.

He leapt.

He flapped.

 

* * *

 

 

It was three days before he managed to glide properly, and then the challenge was to find where Pythagoras might be. He soared over the city, listening, looking for a sign.

He followed the guards as they moved from apartment to apartment, breaking down doors.

When he finally found them, it was too late. The apartment burned, the bodies of Ariadne, Hercules and Pythagoras in the flames. Jason and the Oracle had been taken away to meet some other cruel fate.

Icarus knew he'd have the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that, but the sight of Pythagoras seized at him. He landed in the flames, pulled Pythagoras to his chest--

And only then remembered the fire powder.

 

* * *

 

Icarus woke to the sound of horns.

He'd been close, so close. This time, surely this time--

He rose, made breakfast, prepared his father's medicine. He ignored the rumors as they flew through the city, until late in the day, when he could pretend to ignore them no longer. His father, as he had for many days, caught him leaving and offered to help.

The wings still felt strange. He was terrified, as he was every time he looked at the drop.

But he wished, and prayed, and he remembered to glide.

 

* * *

 

 

Icarus woke to the sounds of the forest.

At first, he wondered if he had finally gone mad.

"Icarus?" Pythagoras said, his voice soft and concerned. Icarus remembered: they had camped here for the night, collapsed together in exhaustion, taking turns at the watch. Pythagoras, already awake, sat at his side.

"I feared I would never hear your voice again," Icarus said.

Pythagoras hesitated for a moment, then gently touched Icarus's shoulder. "As did I," he said. "I've missed you."

"As have I," Icarus said, rising, pulling Pythagoras into his arms. "I would do so many things differently, if I could--"

"Don't," Pythagoras said, and kissed his cheek. "We will begin again."

"I am no stranger to that," Icarus said, and found Pythagoras's mouth, kissing him softly, feeling his blood rise. "I know we must flee, but--"

"Lovebirds," Hercules said, startling them both. "I hate to disturb you, but we must go quickly. You'll have time enough, once we're clear of Pasiphae's grasp."

"Does such a place exist?" Pythagoras said.

"If it does not, we'll make one," Icarus said.

Icarus would have lived the day before a thousand times to see Pythagoras smile at him with such fondness. "Yes," Pythagoras said. "We will."


End file.
